[Intro: Welcome to another episode of the Red & White Podcast where we give you no holds barred NC State sports talk. We’ll tell you how it is even when others won’t. I’m your host Evan and I’d like to welcome back my co-host Dustin who took a week hiatus.

So Dustin, how’s the wedding planning going?

[Intro 2: This week its tourney week [if we lose, well it was tourney week] so we’re going to try and talk hoops with our special guest Cam Bennerman.

For those who might need a refresher
[Cam Intro] In four years, Bennerman earned ACC “Sixth Man,” ACC All Team honors, Academic All ACC and consecutive Nate McMillan defensive awards. State fans remember Bennerman’s ability to hit deep three-point shots and his explosive athleticism. Personally, how can you not love a guy who flushes a fast break dunk right into Duke’s Sheldon Williams’ face?

don’t remember that one? We’ll post the vid in the note

Welcome to the show Cam. Thanks for joining us, to start, can you tell us about how it feels to posterize someone?

Start
Alright lets get started. I’m gonna start this week off with something that has been bugging the hell out of me.

How the hell do you not vote Cat Barber ALL ACC first team? 6 voters didn’t have cat on the first team. The votes should be public so we can see if there is an agenda. OK, i get why some didn’t vote for him for player of the year but to not have him on your first team is just stupid.

– There needs to be a detailed explanation of why someone votes a certain way. Make them justify leaving players off if it seems obvious they shouldn’t have. In no world was he not deserving.

Speaking of player of the year, how does Cat only get 3 votes? Erick Green and Cat had nearly identical seasons but Cat gets 3 votes? I don’t get it at all.

– If someone voted Green POY and didn’t do the same for Cat then they should be stripped of their vote. There has to be some consistency in the way one votes. It shouldn’t change from year to year. You should always have the same set of standards.

Dustin – talk about Abu and Cat most improved players and not getting votes.

– Abu had a very quiet monster year. It was overshadowed by the poor record as well as Cat’s season-long performance. Offensively and defensively he made huge strides.
– With some more talent around him next season he’s primed to be a star.

We’ll post the stats so folks can see for themselves.

Cam, what do you think of the season Cat had?

– Would you have voted him POY?

Last week I talked about Gott’s comments about Cat, did ya’ll hear that? Dustin can you play the clip… Starts at the 7:07

As it happens, Cat already announced he’d be going through the NBA evaluation process which doesn’t mean too much other than he wants to see where he might go but I still think there is no reason for anyone to expect Cat to return. What if he has a Marcus Paige type year, he goes from at worst a 2nd round pick to who knows where.

– The draft next season is also setup to be a bit deeper. He’d get better with another year but this is the year.

I think he’s a scoring point guard and having to share the shots with DSJ, Dorn, Henderson is probably not going to help his numbers any. He’s got to go.

What do ya’ll think? Will Cat make it in the NBA?

E – So when we were talking before we started recording you mentioned you were writing a book, care to tell us what thats about or is it top secret?

CVMXII.com
Book “The Process”

How he can help Cat
Basketball industry is shady
Cam playing JJ at age 10
AAU

E – I think its a common perception among college basketball fans that AAU basketball is about as shady of a business as there is. Teams recruiting players for their AAU squads, shoe companies ‘sponsoring’ those teams and we’ve all heard the stories of highly recruited kids getting shoe money to go a certain school. How much of it is reality?

We’ll take a quick break to pay the bills and be right back to talk about the ACCt. Hopefully Cam will stick around with us.

Break

Win over Wake
– Was ugly but a W. I feel pretty good about playing Wake anywhere outside of Winston-Salem
– Rowan was hot and exactly what Cat needed, some support
– Freeman really struggling with his leg but give the kid some credit he’s still out there giving minutes and playing solid defense

– Defense was a problem as it was all season. Wide open 3’s are never good but are really harmful against Duke.
– This game was a prime example of how a shallow bench comes back to haunt you late in games. At about the 8’ mark you could visually see guys wearing down. Shots got worse and rebounding became almost non-existent.
– Cat’s injury took some fire out of the team when it first happened. Took him a while to get going when he came back in but it seemed to loosen back up after a few minutes. Deficit got to 8 or 9 and between him picking it back up and Greyson Allen being his normal shit ass self we got back in the game.
– Still nothing to be ashamed of in this game (well, maybe the last possession.)
– Another year of Gott getting guys motivated in March. If we could couple that hard play with a good seed to start the tournament we’d be in pretty good shape.

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[Intro 2: This week we cover a variety of topics. End of basketball season, Gottfried’s comments on Cat Barber, Gottfried and UCLA? and the storylines around the Start of spring football practice]

So here we go. Last night we had an, for a lack of a better word, interesting win over BC. Before the game everyone was chalking this up as an easy W as BC is 0-16 in the league but halfway into the game most folks are saying we should lose this game. We were bailed out with a late Mav layup with 1.1 seconds on the clock but the patience by Caleb to look for the second option is what should really be getting the praise.
The story line and what stood out to me was the defensive effort, with that kind of defense the Broughton High girls team would have gave us a tough game. Gott pointed out in his post game that Freeman is still battling leg pain, Mav has a hurt foot so we are essentially a 5 or 6 man rotation. That’s tough but I’m not ready to give Gott a pass on that because defense or the lack thereof has been a trademark of Gott’s tenure at NC State.

Someone tweeted us during the game that this game had the look of the UVA football game that marked the beginning of the end for TOB. I thought that was an interesting point but thankfully we came back and won this one.

One game left @ ND but I think in most people’s mind the season will go down as the lost season. Similar to DD’s first season when Brandon Mitchell went down in the first game of the year. We don’t know what we would have had but we do know it would be better than what we actually had.

All in All, We can’t put it out to pasture fast enough..We’ll probably win a game or two in the ACCT but i don’t expect much beyond that.

Gott’s Comments on Cat
Brody from Twitter reminded us to talk about Gott’s comments about Cat going pro or not going pro.

If you haven’t heard it, listen here. Starts at the 7:07

if it was his last game what would you say about his legacy
“he’s got a lot of basketball to play this year and should be next year here as well” Sort of under his breath.

Im not sure what to make of it. Its about what you expect a coach to say but at the same time Gott seemed to be taken by surprise with the question. You have to know its coming.

Potential Transfers?
James on twitter asked us “with the 3 guys in the bench who play next year who sees cut in minutes and who might transfer”

Hate speculating on transfers because you just don’t know their personal situations. i.e. Deshaun Painter

Keep an eye on the UCLA job….
As we’ve talked about, the only job i can see Gott leaving for would be UCLA. As we’ve been saying since Alford was hired, he’s terrible and only a matter of time before he’s fired. He’s getting worse and worse each year.

Steve Alford’s buyout of $10.4m expires on April 30th, 2016….is $5.2m until April 30, 2018. #interestingfacts

Not a huge recruiting guy but I follow it enough to know what’s going on.

Good class. May have finished 8th in the ACC but there isn’t much difference between the classes 3-10 after FSU and Clemson

Sbnation report link – we will come back to that in a second

Class finished 43 in rivals and when consider the under the radar type linemen we signed (7 of them) it helps put some perspective on the rest of the class. It’s pretty good.
good read about how coaches evaluate offensive linemen http://www.sbnation.com/college-football-recruiting/2016/2/16/11016644/kirby-smart-georgia-offensive-line-recruiting-uga-evaluate

Guys committed early and probably kept them from getting ranked higher but Gee and Sculthorpe have the makeup of excellent linemen . Gees dad is an alum an NFL vet.

Couple of ones that stung are Dexter and Dorn

Can’t blame a guy for picking Clemson right now and they used the hometown hero against us. He didn’t want that pressure

Dorn on the other hand had a ton of offers from the big boys and was a hard State lean (bro on basketball team) but basically change his mind on his visit here for the UNC game in the first quarter. Stings to lose a guy if his caliber to those chumps enough let alone because of that ass whipping in the first quarter

Sbnation article. Outlined how the big dogs in the leagues are out recruiting the rest of the conferences http://www.sbnation.com/college-football-recruiting/2016/2/10/10939292/signing-day-2016-ncaa-recruiting-big-ten-sec-acc

Ohio St and mich combined to out recruit the rest of the big 10west

Clemson and FSU same thing vs the rest of the acc

Huge disparity and makes it hard to win. Have to win with scheme evaluations and coaching .

ACC ranked last of the Power 5 in blue chip recruits. 4 and 5 stars.
http://www.sbnation.com/college-football-recruiting/2016/2/9/10949224/conference-recruiting-rankings-2016

Part 2
Hoops
Wake.
Almost scored 100
Cat with 38.
Mav played well
Caleb played well.
Good movement on offense
Still wake forest, 24 road ACC loses

– Duke
– played hard….slow start, maverick had a good first half
– thought it was a good coaching job by Gott, players didnt execute.
– Dickie V, “Brice Johnson is a lock for ACC POY” frustrating but what do you expect.
– Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski on NC State guard Anthony “Cat” Barber: “Don’t judge how good a guy is just by the record of his team. Because they’re close to winning five more games, but he gives them a chance to win every game. He’s the toughest out in the league.”
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2015-16 Duke vs NC State Box Score

– No 3s from the Martin boys..not a bad thing.

Evan on Gott

Gott has good and Gott has bad.

Right to be worried about the future just as you have the right to be optimistic.

As I’ve said before. I’m not sure where I stand on it. i can see both sides of the argument.

DY has to look and say is Gott going to win in 5 years that’s what leaders do.

But I do think the looming Archie factor is real. He and his wife would not pass up a chance to move back to Raleigh and thats on everyone’s mind. Is Archie’s floor higher than Gott’s ceiling?

Dustin has an interesting comparison here, Mark Gottfried at this point into his NC State career is TOB

– Let’s dive into it.

Is Gottfried providing anything different than TOB did on the football side?

What is NC State basketball and what’s acceptable?

If you say that we aren’t capable of championships anymore and should be happy with being relevant then TOB should never have been fired. That’s the same logic.

– TOB’s highest finish in conference was a tie for 2nd in the division and a tie for the 3rd best record overall in the conference. Gottfried has tied for 4th twice. Other than that we’ve seen 7th, a tie for 6th, and it’ll be a good bit worse than that this season.
———-The kicker in those two 4th place ties is that they were in his first 2 years. Those were Sid’s players. Lowe was an awful coach but he put good guys on the roster. When the bulk of those guys left the conference finish started getting worse.

– TOB inherited a so-so team and never really upgraded the talent level. However, he won games with what he had and catered to the system. Gottfried is recruiting talent but his teams are trending downhill.

– TOB was fired because he wasn’t winning the conference. He would get us to bowl games and that was it. What has Gott done? The loving crowd will say we’ve been to 4 tournaments and 2 Sweet Sixteens. They’re right. Is that as impressive as it seems? I don’t really think so.

– We’ve been an 11, 8, 12, and an 8 seed. A team with 2 national titles in its history can’t be higher than an 8 seed? Is that what NC State basketball is?

– I can see the excitement of being in the tournament. Just being in it is acceptable for some schools. But looking at those seeds seems like something I’d expect from a Wake Forest or a normal conference winner from a smaller school. I’ll use Dayton as an example just to piss more people off.
– I’m going to rattle off 2 sets of seeds. Tell me which sounds better –
– 11, 8, 12, 8
– 7, 9, 3, 10

– Those are Gott’s first 4 years and Herb’s first 4 years. Sendek had a 5th straight year in the tournament as a 10th seed. Gott won’t have that.
– Branching off that – Gott gets teams into the tournament because he’s a master of the schedule. Being good at planning schedules isn’t all it takes to be a good coach. NC State should make the tournament. NC State shouldn’t be sitting on the bubble hoping that scheduling is what gets them in.
– TOB got teams to the football version of a postseason. We made bowl games. The schedule helped some of those years. We wouldn’t have necessarily made a bowl game without the help of a good schedule to get us there.
So the next argument people cling to is that we’ve had 2 sweet sixteens in 4 years. (I know. I was one of those guys.) Let’s break those down –

2012 (11)
– In the first game we had a matchup against Goliath like San Diego St (6). That’s right – We were 5 seeds lower than San Diego State. Woo yay. NC State should beat San Diego State EVERY DAMN TIME they step on the court. As it should have been State won 79-65. We should be in the top half of the ACC every year. That’s the result that should come from an upper half ACC team playing SDSU.

– In the second game we had a 3 point win over Georgetown (3). This was a good Georgetown team and it was a close win. It was a good win. Georgetown and NCSU should be close to each other in perception and expectations. Nothing wrong with that.

– Next round we lose to Kansas (2). We lost 60-57. There’s no shame in that. They were very good that year and we should have lost that.

– This was a good run. This was the more respectable of the 2 sweet sixteens.2015 (8)

– In the first game we needed a last second tip-in from Anya to beat a 9 seed LSU. This was LSU without Ben Simmons. This was a 9 seed out of the SEC. There was nothing impressive about this win except for the fact that they didn’t quit. This team had Trevor Lacey. This team should have won that game before the last second.

– Here it is. The one that gives everyone a chubby. #1 Villanova goes down. I won’t say that a win over a 1 seed isn’t impressive because it is. I WILL say that a few weeks before the bracket came out I talked on this podcast about how I PRAYED we got Nova. I knew we could beat them. It was a horrible matchup for them and I thought we were a better team. You can go back and listen to this. I said we’d beat Nova. They were an overrated 1. Either way we won.

– Next game we lose to another ACC team in 4 seed Louisville. We should be on close to an even level with Louisville. They beat us by 10.

– A sweet sixteen is a sweet sixteen. I can break down the negatives all day but it is what it is.

– So cool. 4 years and 2 sweet sixteens. 50% of the time it happens. The first one was pretty convincing. The second? Last second win against LSU doesn’t get me stoked.

– As for the other 2 years – 2013 brought a loss to 9 seed Temple in the first game. 2014 brought a win in the FIRST FOUR. THE FIRST FOUR. We beat fellow 12 seed Xavier before losing to 5 St. Louis in the next game. The actual start of the tournament. The first four shouldn’t even count. We’ve basically been one and done’s in the other 2.

– TOB won a few bowl games. Did he win a championship? No. Gottfried has won some postseason games. Did he win a championship? No. No ACC regular season, no ACC tournament. and he’s won a couple of games in the tournament 2 out of 4 years. Do both of those not seem like the definition of mediocrity?

– With TOB we expected to make a bowl game. With Gott we expect to make the tournament. With TOB we expected to sometimes win the bowl game. With Gott we can sometimes expect to advance in the tournament. It’s gone nowhere past that.

– Do we want to be a sweet sixteen team? Is that the ceiling? Is that what your season tix and WPC dollars get you? A team that never contends for a championship? Is that acceptable? If it is then, by all means, I congratulate you. You’re getting exactly what you want. – Problem is – NCSU is more than that. TOB led a football program that didn’t win championships but had some notable wins (remember how much you enjoyed those FSU and Clemson wins?) Seem mediocre? Gottfried leads a program that doesn’t win championships but has some notable wins (Seems the only games we can win this year are against ranked teams.) What’s the difference?

– D – We’re joined by Drew Vachal who is the founder and creator of Bronco Nation News and he’s here to give NC State fans some insight into our new OC Eliah Drinkwitz who is 6 years removed from being a high school offensive coordinator and is now the OC of a P5 school.
– E – Let’s start with an easy one Drew, What was the general opinion of Drinkwitz? Were folks excited when he was hired?
– From a reasonable standpoint and from a fan standpoint which are usually very different.
– D – I know there’s been crazy turnover there year to year at the OC position. Looking from a pure numbers standpoint it seems like y’all had a great year. Was that on him or just the system that he inherited and continued with?
– E – What kind of general offense can we expect? Seems like a spread but you’ve seen a lot more of it than we have.
– D – Pretty impressive what he did with a first year QB. He’ll be in the same situation in Raleigh. Were the numbers put up more on the pure talent of the player or do you think the system that Drinkwitz ran had a lot to do with it?
– E – A big problem we had this year was red-zone offense. What were his go to Red Zone plays?
– Were there any questionably consistent calls? EX Lots of spread teams love the end zone fade even though it rarely works
– D – We’ve heard good things about his recruiting. Is it as good as we think and who are some of the key guys he’s landed?
– E – Any particular region of the country he’s had more success in?

Part Two – Basketball is <<<
- D - Last time we were 0-4 in conference was under Les Robinson. He’s been gone a while. So that’s good.
- E - Have to imagine that this team would be WAY better if it had what it was supposed to have.
- Trevor Lacey was expected to come back. That would be 2 POY candidates.
- Kyle Washington was expected to come back. While not always ideal he would be a decent body inside.
- Terry Henderson wasn’t expected to miss every game after the first. Medical redshirt?
- D - People are getting their pitchforks out. Is that reasonable?
- Gott has taken us to 4 NCAA’s and 2 sweet sixteens.
- There’s gotten to be consistency making the tournament but is being a bubble team and getting in acceptable?
- E - Link to my tweet about disappointment
- its more than about one good year. the program at this point should be able to withstand Lacey Leaving and a henderson injury.
- Missed on Seth Allen and devonte Graham (killers)
- disappointed in the effort
- D - I’m going to shock a lot of people with this.
- I’ve been very adamant that people don’t have a right to jump on Gott because of one bad year and I still feel that way.
- 4 tournaments earns you the right to have a bad year.
- We just extended his contract. People saying he needs to be fired for ONE bad year are crazy.
- So call me crazy - this is the year to make a move.
- He won’t have many years like this and we’ll be back in the tournament next year. That will continue the trend and there won’t be a good time to make a change.
- Again, he doesn’t deserve it. At all. He’s earned possibly 2 bad years before addressing it but I don’t think he has another for a while.
- There are people (fans and people that matter) that want Archie. This is the opportunity.
- Is it dirty? Yep.
- Does he deserve it? Nope.
- Is not caring what it takes to have a successful program? Probably.
Ledford
https://twitter.com/ChandlerGreer78/status/687717058264580096

The greatest podcast rivalry in history. Red & White Podcast vs Riddick & Reynolds Podcast. James Curle and Matt Purdy from the Riddick & Reynolds podcast joined us for a football season roundtable wrap-up. We talked about the disappointment of a 7-6 season, coaching changes, the state of the program and why reasonable State fans should still be 100% behind Dave Doeren.
Let us know if you agree, disagree or in general just have something to say after you listen.